A Costly Exchange
by LadyHaddock
Summary: "You know, for a moment there I thought you were a Valkyrie." "We're not dead yet, you muttonhead." Snotlout never fathomed his final hour would be like this.
1. A Costly Exchange

**A COSTLY EXCHANGE**

"Guess it's just you and me then, huh?" Metallic wet floods the inside of his mouth as his head lolls to the side, the crisp snow burning his cheek. He looks softly, reverently, at the features of her face. "You know, for a moment there I was sure you were a Valkyrie."

He watches her swallow and struggle to breathe. She stares hard at the ceiling, where the stalactites dangle like swords taunting their doom, before her voice escapes in a rasp. "Mmh, must really look the part."

Everything _but_. Crimson leaks from her shoulder-guards and her steel-blue shirt is frayed and blotched with a deep, hideous purple. It sticks to her like a layer of scales on her Nadder, and the red is _everywhere – _her bracers, her face, even her braid.

She turns to look at him when he doesn't retort. "We're not dead yet, you muttonhead."

He chuckles, and immediately wishes he hadn't because a fit of wheezes follows.

"Though I probably look a right sight better than you." Her eyes scout over his own disheveled form and the reddening snow-bed around his abdomen. His left helm-horn lies at the crevice, half sunken and split in two. It matches the cleave trailing his forehead. "What a mess."

Astrid can't believe this is how she will die. She'd awoken that very dawn and wondered with a hopeful heart if today was the day she and Hiccup would _happen_. If today they would plunge through their poor facade of friendly comforts and collide in an explosion of heat and chaos and beauty. Not an explosion of fire in a crumpled mountainside cavern. Not an eminent chaos drowned by a wall of snow. Not the beauty of synced dragon and rider torn apart, neither knowing the fate of the other. Today had held so much more.

Not even Snotlout fathomed a final hour such as _this_. The gods must be laughing at him. Greater Vikings and deaths worthy of Valhalla, guts and glory and valor renowned – he just had to go and debate that one this morning, didn't he? And what did he get? His own guts shredded while he lay gasping for air. All glory in sacrifice lost, a disparate moment of valor that amounted to nothing with _her_ lying broken next to him. He must have been Loki'd in the true sense after all; he'd thought his tale would have ended in grandeur.

Astrid's arm flinches, merely a fraction, toward him.

"Why, Snotlout?" Her voice is now ghostly quiet, fading like the color in her skin. She catches his eyes, the swirls of dark in them dulling. "Why did you…?"

He holds her gaze for a moment. "I don't know. My body just… moved."

She smiles sadly, dragging her bloodstained hand toward his, painting the snow crimson between them. Their knuckles brush together and her fingers catch his. "You're a reckless idiot, you know that?"

He counters her look, squeezing back, and for a moment the shadow of his daffy self plays on his face.

Just for a moment – but she is glad to catch it.

"I thought for once I'd have a bit more than insults for company."

Astrid rolls her eyes with a pained smirk, resuming her ceiling-gazing. The swords seem closer somehow. They are already piercing and slicing her entire being; her head and chest want to explode and even her spine aches with the slightest movement.

She winces as she attempts to lie more comfortably, and through his numbness Snotlout feels as if his own body wants to split. Impossibly he finds himself on his side, wounds he thought empty re-gushing and fresh blood trickling down from lips to ear.

"What-?"

"Promise you won't h-hit me this time?"

His goad is rhetorical, and he motions for her to mimic his position, gripping her hands reassuringly as she struggles in a twist to face him. He leans in, very close, and for a wild moment Astrid is overwhelmed by the urge to punch him (fatigue be damned), before she notices his free hand reaching across her shoulder.

Her axe. The last time he'd touched her _axe_, she'd knocked him unconscious.

Between an excruciating grunt and a fit of scarlet coughs, Snotlout unsheathes the weapon and slides it across the ice. "B-better?"

Astrid gives a frail nod, contemplating his dulling eyes. They are wide with fear but sincere and resolute – two emotions she'd never imagined compatible with the clown of their team.

"Good. D-don't say I never... do anything m-meaningful." Snotlout's supporting arm gives way and he falls back, panting. His head settles heavily against the ground and he shifts his gaze to the icy blades above them.

Astrid remains on her side, knowing that once she repositions herself she'll be too weak to move again. Her chest aches with every breath, her head continues to throb. Her body is burning. And it is freezing. There is more ice in here than she'd realized at first, and the cavern would look very beautiful, she thinks, if circumstances were different.

She wishes Hiccup were here. Hiccup would have held her. Hiccup would have kissed away the pain and cold from her hands and cheeks. Hiccup would have stilled her fear and somehow reassured her that dying wasn't the worst.

But moreover, she wishes that _Snotlout isn't_ dying. He hadn't even given her a chance to save him, to beg for his life. And now she'll never be able to do so for anyone else. She'd failed him.

Astrid watches him quiver, from the pain or the cold or maybe both, until she can't bear it any longer.

He flinches as her smaller form shakily collapses against him. She groans loudly, and Snotlout decides he feels fortunate that his own numbness is kicking in. "D-damn it, Astrid, is it always violence with you?"

"S-sorry, I didn't m-mean to…" her voice trails off in a wheeze. But she catches his lopsided smirk and despite the fire coursing through her torso, she grits her teeth and grins back.

He uses the last of his strength to guide her into him – gently, carefully, more for her wounds than his own – and for the first time in all the time he's known her, she accepts his embrace.

But her body breaks into shivers as she buries her face in his furs, feebly clutching his blood-spattered tunic, and he realizes with astonishment that she is crying.

Fearless Astrid Hofferson is lying in _his_ arms and she is _crying_.

And for the first time since she's known him, The Snotman doesn't turn it into a joke.

His leaden hand moves of its own accord, rubbing slow, faint circles on her back. He watches her trembling form, petite and – the thought frightens him – _frail_ against his own albeit shorter but sturdier build. _It could have worked,_ he selfishly fools himself for a moment, _We could have__…_

_No._

It isn't his arms she seeks. Not his gestures that can comfort her, nor his words that can console her.

_It would never be._

"I know I'm not… _him_… b-but some extra muscle can't be the w-worst disappointment in a cavern of ice."

He half expects her to miraculously muster the strength to punch him, to send a blast of pain bounding through his limbs, revive his waning being. Instead, her trembling gives way to heftier sobs, and for an anomalous moment Snotlout is silent.

"Muttonhead," she eventually chokes. "I wasn't… for H-Hiccup…"

"You're crying for _me_ then? W-wow, Astrid… You d-_do_ love me after all."

"Don't p-push it. Just because I can't h-hit you right now."

They both chuckle – regretfully, for Snotlout's chest heaves into a string of coughs angrier than ever and sends a fresh convulsion of pain tremoring through hers. Grimacing, she soothes him with her palm, ear brushing over his ailing heartbeat.

They are quiet for a long time, simply listening to the stutter of their breaths and the soft wisp of wind moaning through the crevice. His is so much worse.

"At least the company in Valhalla will be insult-free," Astrid finally murmurs. "Top-of-the-line glory… feasts with the gods… the most beautiful women…"

Snotlout half snorts half chokes. "So long as _you_ don't f-follow me there."

Despite the numbness and biting cold, she feels the flush in her cheeks.

"Promise… promise me…"

Astrid can no longer move her head to catch his eyes. "Snotlout…"

"They'll… _he'll_… find you… he will… just promise you'll… s-stay alive… and t-take c-care of Hookfang."

Astrid squeezes her eyes shut, daring against everything to hope, daring to make his sacrifice worth… something. "I-I will…" She tightens her grip on his tunic, the only form of reassurance she's able to give. "Thank you, Snotlout."

"And j-just so you know…" he takes a rattly breath that catches in his shredded lungs, "I was always… routing for you."

He releases that breath with a slower, almost gentle sigh that echoes throughout the cave.

"Snotlout," Astrid whispers.

His chest is still against her cheek.

His heartbeat is gone.

And it dawns on her as if she was being swallowed alive that he is dead. Snotlout Jorgensen. Their joker; their trickster; her muttonhead. She would laugh if she doesn't want to cry and if she could breathe.

Astrid only notices then that both his arms are enclosing her.

"Thank you," she whispers softly, hoping against all hope that Hiccup will find her, "For my life."

She takes a sharp breath – it is incredibly painful now – and with all the world's effort she trails her hand up to his face, smearing his jaw with blood. She makes sure his eyes are closed and that his head is turned to the ceiling.

He is still, so, so still, and it is unbelievable. She leans into him as best she can, soaking in his retaining warmth. And she relays her promise over and over, like a mantra, until the blackness takes her.

* * *

It is well past dark when he finds them, Hookfang and Stormfly restlessly bashing at the mountainside like the fragile heart beating beneath his ribs. Fishlegs is already running through possible scenarios and the twins are deep in squabble.

He is off Toothless' saddle before another word can register.

"Hiccup, wait for us! Don't hog all the gl-!"

Tuffnut never finishes his sentence as the group of stunned Vikings stumbles into the cavern, met with a gut-wrenching sight. Snotlout and Astrid's bodies are still, tattered and blood-soaked, expressions peaceful. They are asleep in each other's arms. Something is very, very wrong.

"ASTRID!"

Peg leg on ice, Hiccup almost ends up a tattered heap himself as he hurtles toward his best (human) friend, his confidante, his rock. By the time the others catch up he is carefully clutching her to his chest, tears wetting the dry blood in her hair with his forehead pressed firmly against hers.

"They're alive!" he chokes, looking up through swimming vision. He kisses her knuckles, and her brow, and her knuckles again. "They're _alive!"_

It is only at Hookfang's unruly wail that Hiccup tears his gaze from Astrid and his reverie crashes down.

Fishlegs succumbs to a sob, fingers trembling at Snotlout's pulse spot.

For the first time, Tuff is speechless and Ruff seems paralyzed by shock.

The seconds feel like an eternity before their beefy strategist cuts the silence. "Astrid needs serious medical attention, or this will all be for nothing. Snotlout would have…" his voice shatters, quieting to a ghostly whisper, "died for nothing."

Hiccup nods determinedly, resolving to leader mode. "We need to sear her wounds now, she's already lost too much blood." He doesn't care to wipe the tears streaming his cheeks for their less fortunate comrade. "Ruff?"

The female Thorston regains herself and the pair gently carry Astrid aside, followed by her restless Nadder.

"You two stay with Snotlout and tend to Hookfang," Hiccup orders the others before exchanging a glance with Toothless, "And you too, bud."

"Do you think Fishlegs is right?" Ruffnut asks quietly as she lowers their unconscious friend into his lap, "He was protecting her?"

Hiccup brushes a tangle of sticky fringe from Astrid's forehead, eyes never leaving her face. "Yeah. By the looks of his wounds h-he… he took the front of the blast."

Ruff considers him for a long moment. "That's almost beyond noble for our Snotman… But he'd have preferred to go that way," she follows her leader's gaze, eyes softening as she recalls a debate only hours ago, "and saving the greatest Viking on Berk at that."

Hiccup looks up at last and a sad smile with a hint of mischief dances on the Thorston's face.

"What? Snotlout can no longer challenge you for best dragon master but like Tuff and I told him this morning, when it comes to raw Vikingness the title's always belonged to Astrid."

Despite himself, Hiccup gives a watery chuckle. "I never disagreed with that last part."

"I guess in the end, neither did he."

"Ruff, could you… help me with this?"

She shoots him a knowing smirk, eyeing his and Astrid's interlaced fingers, before pulling at the crimson material stuck to the latter's skin.

Hiccup gives Stormfly a reassuring scratch. "It's alright," he whispers, more to himself than the dragon, "It's alright, girl, we've got her. She's going to be okay."

Despite the firm desire to preserve Astrid's dignity, he cannot bring himself to look away. He fights down the bile in his throat at Ruff's handiwork, hit with inordinate dread at the raw gushes across her chest. Stormfly softly licks his tears from her rider's cheeks while the pair clean what they can with shaking fingers.

"I'm sorry, Ast," Hiccup whispers, voice breaking as he rips a strip off his tunic to place between her teeth, "but this is going to hurt." Praying to all the gods that she doesn't wake up in next few moments, he draws Inferno and prepares to ignite the blade.

Throwing a glance back at Snotlout's body being cleansed by an equally pale Fishlegs, Hiccup is overwhelmed with a paramount reverence and gratitude, and pained to know that no matter what he can never pay it back.

"Thank you, Snotlout," he breathes in a whisper only Astrid would hear if she were to wake. He lays a gentle kiss to her forehead, "For my life."


	2. Aftermath

**AN: Due to a couple of requests, and people following this oneshot, I've ended up writing an aftermath. Many thanks to the reviewers, I appreciate your feedback. So here is how I would personally envision Astrid to react - would love to hear what you guys think.**

* * *

**AFTERMATH**

The flame wakes her. From her chest it burns, burns like nothing she's ever felt in her life. It taunts her, goading her back to heavy sleep.

She knows she must fight it, for whatever reason – that she is somehow alive, kicking and flailing at the two blurry figures subduing her, screaming over the ghastly wails coming from behind them.

But the pain is too much; it is execrable, nauseating.

Astrid yaks, and the world spins to black.

* * *

She opens her eyes and desperately shuts them again. She writhes and twists and thrashes, but the fire only aggravates.

More blurred figures surround her, pinning her efforts to make it all stop, yelling unintelligible words as her screams and the wails echo like a chorus of tortured fiddles around the cavern.

Darkness swallows them.

* * *

Her body is numbing. The fire is dying. And the wails – the wails are louder.

They belong to a creature – a dragon. A Nightmare. It is in agony.

None of what Astrid is hearing is making any sense, and her perception of it all dims intermittently as she flits in and out of consciousness. Where is Snotlout? He had been there just moments ago. With this distressed dragon tearing around, he might be hurt.

"She's awake!" a husky voice cries out.

"Stormfly, no!" yells another, female.

"Someone keep Stormfly back!"

Her Nadder… she's okay… _Thank Thor_… (From what, Astrid isn't quite certain.)

The voices are all familiar, but they're not the one she is straining to hear. "Snotlout?" she croaks. "Where… where is he?"

A pair of hands cups her face, "Astrid, can you hear me?"

She licks her dry lips. "Where is Snotlout?"

"Astrid," Hiccup looms over her, filling her vision with wild, russet hair. "Astrid, look at me."

"Hiccup…" _Oh gods, Hiccup!_ Astrid struggles to sit up, even though her body doesn't appear to be working. "Snotlout– he's hurt… I have to find him, I have to–"

"For Thor's sake, Astrid, _don't move!"_ Hiccup forcefully pushes her back down (though it doesn't require much effort). He squeezes her hand, "You need to stay still. _Please_. You need to stay with us."

It is then that Astrid catches the stench of torrefied flesh and vomit. She disobeys Hiccup, expending all her strength in a feeble twist, and the fire wakes again, the world whirling viciously as she yaks once more on the snow.

"She's losing consciousness, Hiccup!"

"No," Hiccup's palm trails shakily across her jawline. "No, no, no, Astrid, you need to hold on – you need to stay awake!"

She attempts to squeeze his hand back but finds her fingers benumbed. The spinning is too much, her eyelids are heavy.

Hiccup's grip tightens. "Astrid, stay with us!"

She tries. She tries very hard.

But she can't. He fades away.

* * *

She can't count the people around her. She can't even make them out. They feel like demons, pulling at her clothes and her body and speaking in low, unintelligible voices Astrid isn't meant to hear. But she could care less about all that.

"Hiccup… Where's Hiccup?"

Gentle fingers wrap over hers and she meets a pair of consoling emerald eyes. "I'm right here."

She tries to sit again but her body refuses, "And Snotlout?"

Hiccup looks at her as if unsure what to say. Slowly, the world around him unblurs; the icy blades on the ceiling are gone, and Astrid's eyes meet wood in their place. The room is familiar. It is _her_ room – at the Edge, in her hut. The fuzzy mountain to her left is Fishlegs, and Tuff and Ruff are there too. But…

"Snotlout. Where _is_ he?" she demands, unnerved to find their expressions anxious and sorrowful.

Everyone is watching Hiccup, whose jade orbs hold the truth the shieldmaiden doesn't want to see. "Astrid…"

No.

Astrid stares at him, wide-eyed.

No, it can't be…

"_You know, for a moment there I was sure you were a Valkyrie."_

"_We're not dead yet, you muttonhead."_

He can't be, he's _not _– she won't believe it. He's messing with her in typical Snotlout-fashion. Waiting to pull some dumb, ridiculous prank to get a reaction, and tease her for worrying about him, for thinking him hurt. To make her fume when the tears dissolve upon realization.

Shamelessly, they begin to cascade.

"_You're crying for _me,_ then?"_

It's a joke – a sick, twisted joke. She'll be resisting the urge to send him to Valhalla for worrying her like this.

"_So long as _you_ don't follow me there."_

"No." Astrid shakes her head as the world starts to spin again.

He hasn't left, not like that; Snotlout is a warrior – a pig-headed, reckless, foolhardy _warrior_. It would take more than a crumbling mountainside to bring him down.

"_I know I'm not _him,_ but some extra muscle can't be the worst disappointment in a cavern of ice."_

Glory and valor, wasn't it? The stuff he'd boasted being made of since they were kids? Well he'd stolen her chance to prove hers.

He owes her, dammit. _He owes her;_ the chance to best him, to save him in return. So he _can't _leave, not until she's had her fair shot.

"No, no, no, he's not– he hasn't." It's too unfair, too… selfish.

"_Just promise me you'll stay alive, and take care of Hookfang."_

"He hasn't!"

He's too damn _selfish!_

To pull the self-sacrificing act that _she_ was supposed to make; to shield her body while _his_ body broke; to hold her like everything was going to be alright while he lay bleeding to death!

"_Promise… promise me…"_

The tears are now streaming down her cheeks. Strong arms wrap around her but her shaking body fights them, repelling their comfort.

Her chest explodes in agony once again as Astrid lurches forward, gulping back vomit with a hefty sob. And as the room distorts in a violent twist, the warmth of Snotlout's last embrace breaks through, surrounding her in lankier, leaner arms.

"Hiccup," she manages to choke against the pain, seizing his tunic in an iron grasp and burying her face in his chest.

"_I know I'm not… _him…_ but…"_

"Don't go."

The bed shifts beneath her as the spinning escalates, and Astrid squeezes her eyes shut, her grip tightening as she feels a weight sink down beside her – Hiccup's leg brushing against hers, Hiccup's arms pulling her close.

"Don't go," she repeats between sobs, "Don't l-leave me, don't go."

"I've got you, Astrid," he replies firmly, encircling her with the same vigor as the man who'd died holding her like that. "I'm not going anywhere."

He can't. She won't let him, not _him_.

"_Wow, Astrid… You _do_ love me after all."_

"H-Hiccup…"

* * *

She awakens in a warm embrace, firm but gentle, and for a moment Astrid believes she is back in the cavern with Snotlout beneath her.

Snotlout holding her, Snotlout protecting her. Snotlout _alive_.

Though even before the fuzzy darkness lifts, she knows it isn't him.

She knows the piney, forgey scent like Stormfly can track a waft in a mile of forest – the scent that is home.

She knows the feel of the arms around her – strong and safe, and tender. So, so tender.

She knows every shade of forest that can stare for eternity into her seas; the wild locks that beckon for her fingers to explore; the constellation of freckles dancing around that adorable scar, beneath the ravishing lips she so desperately longs to taste.

Her gaze meets Hiccup's in the early morning light – or late evening, could be – and it conveys every emotion they've ever shared with a thousand more.

"Hey," he whispers with sheer reverence.

"Hey," Astrid croaks, not sure whether she wants to rejoice or cry. But before her mind can settle a reaction, her body decides to cringe at the soreness consuming it.

"Easy now," Hiccup hugs her ever gently, hands massaging soft circles on her back. She groans with a shudder. "Is… is this okay?"

They are in her bed, Astrid hazily recalls – Hiccup propped at the headboard with both arms supporting her as she half sits half lays on her side. Her armor is removed and her clothes are fresh, clean but for the odd spatter of blood matching that on the sheets. Ruff's handiwork, probably.

Though the binds on her torso are far too delicate for the Thorston's doing. Too sore for the blush to bother her, she nods faintly.

Hiccup brushes the sticky bangs from her forehead. "How are you feeling?"

"It hurts… everything hurts."

His look is almost enough to release the impending flux of tears. Her head throbs. Her chest wants to explode. Her back and abdomen sting like the dwelling of a hundred knives.

But nothing aches like the hole in her heart; a shame-filled void left by an irreplaceable piece of her torn away.

"It's gonna be alright," Hiccup assures, "Gothi's on her way here. But Fishlegs reckons you broke a few ribs, and you've been bleeding inside too. We thought…" he trails off, voice cracking and eyes welling with tears.

Self-contempt sieves through pain and guilt. First Snotlout, and now she has hurt _Hiccup_ too. Astrid tears her gaze away, suddenly finding herself unable to look at him.

"I'm sorry," she whispers, squeezing her eyes shut to prevent the flood. "Oh gods, Hiccup, I'm so sorry."

She can sense his pity before he speaks and it brings an additional swell of anger at herself. "Astrid–"

"It's my fault. Snotlout, he… it's all my fault."

"No," Hiccup's voice is soft, sincere, "It's the hunters' fault."

She shakes her head fiercely, inducing a fresh bout of dizziness. "If I was quicker – _better_ – if I'd just– he'd… he never would have…"

"There was nothing you could have done, Ast–"

"But it was for _me!_ It was all because of me – he threw his _life _away for me!" Her voice shatters as a sound Astrid never thought she'd ever make escapes her throat, and beyond the ache and vertigo she feels Hiccup flinch at her words.

A firm hand curls around her bicep. "Astrid… Astrid look at me."

She can't. Not after what she's done; he's too good, too pure, too… blinding to behold. It would break her.

Astrid balls his tunic in her fist, knuckles turning white, and for a mad second she wishes she is back in that cavern – without Hiccup, without Snotlout. No man to pour out his comforts while she gives back nothing but pain. She bites her lip to stop it quivering. She tastes a metallic tinge.

"Ast…" Hiccup repeats with desperation, all but begging her, "Look at me. _Please_."

Her wall is fracturing faster than she can hold it, his plea now dragging her to the brink. Under closed lids she looks into a blackness that frightens her; that calls to her with all the murmurs of a life of possibilities she stole; dreams trounced and erased before their time.

Swallowing the bile in her throat, Astrid forces herself to meet his eyes. Tears roll freely down her cheeks as her voice escapes in a barely audible choke.

"I _failed_ him, Hiccup."

Hiccup shakes his head, firm. "_None_ of this is your fault, Astrid. None of it. It's the hunters' fault. They're the ones who came to take our dragons and pursued you with the intent to kill – it's all on them. And Snotlout…" he swallows heavily, his voice beginning to quaver. "It was his choice. You didn't fail him, okay? He made his _own_ choice. Hel, he never listened to his father, let alone mine. In my whole life I can never recall my cousin listening to _anyone_. You wouldn't have been able to stop him if you tried – which you wouldn't even have had time to _think_ of doing under the circumstances you were in."

He cups her cheek with a tender palm. It is a touch foreign to her skin – like the sun's warmth shining on a Scauldron of the deep. Astrid flinches.

He wipes her cheek dry, and a fresh tear rolls over his thumb. "Snotlout did what he believed was right. We're Vikings, we know the risks. He knew exactly what he was doing, and he decided that it was worth it. He _believed_ in you, Ast, like all of us do. Fishlegs, Tuff and Ruff… Heather… you don't know much you mean to us. And to me… I…"

Astrid searches those jade orbs with desperation, selfishly hopeful for her darkened thoughts to lift. And through her swimming vision she realizes that Hiccup is crying too.

"We need you… _I_… need you. And it wasn't just…" he gulps thickly, "It wasn't just _your_ life that Snotlout gave back to you… but mine too." Fervently, determinedly, he catches her startled, desperate eyes with his own. "I love you, Astrid. And if I'd lost you now, I'd… I can't…

I can't imagine my life without you."

Astrid's heart sticks her throat as she stares at him wide-eyed, pupils blown.

And at last, the wall crumbles for the both of them.

Reality seeps in like a flesh wound on fabric, and the final ounce of anger Astrid had clung on to dissipates. Sending an agonizing convulsion of pain through her ribs, she buries herself in Hiccup's neck, bumping his chin with her forehead as she clutches him as tightly as humanly possible. In one fervent movement he wraps her up in both arms and presses his cheek into her hair, wetting the rest of her face while her tears soak the hem of his tunic.

"I love you too, Hiccup," she chokes, hoping the words are intelligible through her sobs, and they cling to each other for an eternity; weeping for Snotlout, for their both being here, for their lives entwined by a love inseparable. And as Hiccup holds her trembling body like their friend had on his snowy deathbed, Astrid imagines those huge arms protecting her – the arms that allowed her to be here now, safe in the place where he would have wanted.

"Everything's going to change now, isn't it?" she breathes at last with a watery rasp.

"It is," Hiccup murmurs back, giving her a squeeze.

An affirmation is all he can offer; and every gesture substitutes a host of words inadequate. For words are not strong enough now.

They stay like that, tightly holding one another, conveying silent comforts for the position they now find themselves in. That they've embraced the tragedy of war – _real_ war. But while they've lost a precious friend and part of themselves forever, they've stepped into a new and stronger future, together as one.

A new murk has settled – as well as a new dawn – and they're on the precipice of the next battle. The time for games is over.

Astrid inhales deeply, shaky fingertips trailing Hiccup's collarbone. "I'm scared, Hiccup."

He lays a calloused hand over hers and weaves their fingers together. "Me too."

She closes her eyes at the touch, his thumb brushing her knuckles in soft, tender strokes. It is an action so comfortable, so intimate; like he's been doing it their entire lives.

Carefully, she pulls back to look up at him. "Hiccup… thank you," she winces, "for being here. I'm glad you're with me."

He gazes down at her with red and puffy eyes, and Astrid perceives he's been crying for a lot longer than her being conscious. Beneath his heartfelt smile, his cheeks are sunken, and purple bags rest under his beautiful foresty eyes. An overwhelming warmth hits her at the realization of what he has endured for her over the past few hours… days…

His face is freckled and flushed, and close – so close that she can see the fine trail of peach fuzz lining his jaw. And Astrid finds herself leaning in, eyes half-lidded, as desire wins over her exhausted body. Hiccup is already mirroring her, fingers flexed over her cheek in a soft enamoring touch. The tips of their noses brush, and eyelids drift shut when longing lips connect at last.

The kiss is slow, warm and wet, mingled with the salty flavor of their tears. Astrid brushes her lips over his as he leisurely mimics the movement, each allowing the other to relish in their taste. She opens her mouth to drink him in as he tilts down to better match the profile of her lips, and she finds a new fire coursing through her – fiercer and stronger than the one she'd brought from the cavern.

Too sore to lift her hand up to those beckoning locks, she settles for the feel of his pounding heartbeat – zestful and restive and very much _alive_.

Pulling back only at a fresh bout of pain, Astrid slowly opens her eyes to half-lidded. "Will you… stay here with me? A little longer?"

Hiccup meets her gaze, softly, reverently. "Of course." His protecting arm winds back around her, "I promised I wouldn't leave you, didn't I?"

And as he gently guides her into him and she snuggles up at his chest, Astrid allows herself the tiniest bit of hope, her mind drifting to a smug, raven-haired comrade wandering the halls of Valhalla.

"_He'll find you. He will… Just promise you'll stay alive, and take care of Hookfang."_

She'd been allowed the chance to keep her promise after all.


End file.
